


Night Shift

by kronette



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-31
Updated: 2012-12-31
Packaged: 2017-11-23 04:03:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/617876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kronette/pseuds/kronette
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This was a time when you could feel <em>night</em>.  Between 0200 and 0400 in the morning.  The dead of night.  All was still, deathly quiet.  The blackness was tangible, the darkness a caressing hand.  A mother's touch.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Night Shift

This was a time when you could  _feel_   **night**. Between 0200 and 0400 in the morning. The dead of night. All was still, deathly quiet. The blackness was tangible, the darkness a caressing hand. A mother's touch.

The air was cold; the blackness felt colder, heavy upon him. The darkness was like a blanket, covering him. It pressed against his eyes. Foggy mists swirled around him, through him. Enveloped him. He sat perched upon a cliff, upon a rock, the coldness permeating his clothing. His bones.

The soft lapping of the water on the shore filtered up to his ears, the only sound - pounding in his ears, loud as his own heartbeat.

Far below him, he knew, flowed a great river. The Big Muddy. The Mighty Miss. The Mississippi. Flowing agelessly, unchanging. It too was black; black as night, black as the sky. The Mighty Miss continued her endless journey, oblivious to his attention. It rolled on steadily; confidently. Repeating the relentless ebb and flow of agelessness; timelessness.

The semi-smoothness of the murky water was cut by a black figure. Shapeless. A faint light peered eerily through the dark, the soft light blurring the edges. It was a spotlight, lighting the way, guiding something. It shone vainly, hazily, muted by the same air it dared to cut through. The darkness pushed against it, compressing it. The barge, or boat, he could not be sure, could never be sure, sliced its way through the water. Barely causing a ripple.

The barge stole quietly along; movement so slow, it was nearly imperceptible. Except to the figure on the cliff, seated upon the rock. He had sat for hours, his sharp blue eyes steady on the barge, watching. Wondering. Waiting.

The gentle waves lapped at it's sides, gently nudging it to its destination. The shapeless figure rounded the gentle arc of the river bend, taking an eternity to complete its journey. Eventually the spotlight turned with it, no longer obstructing his view. It was a barge, though its contents were still blurred by the cover of deep, dark night.

This was the cold of aloneness. Loneliness. The coldness of space itself. He came here, more often lately. He didn't know why. He just knew he needed this quiet, this solitude. It helped him listen to himself, to understand himself. The unending journey of the river reminded him of the journey he was on now. The journey they were all on.

It reminded him of his own mortality. It reminded him of age and eons ago. It spoke to him of agelessness. Timelessness. The river to him *was* Timelessness. He knew it would be there, waiting for him. He could sit upon this same rock and stare out through the darkness, and it would be there, still continuing it's journey.

That is what he came here for. A sense that once they returned home, something familiar would still be there. Something back on Earth he could latch on to, cling to like a log floating down the river. He spotted one at that instant, just as the barge made its final stretch and the light beamed off into the inky blackness. Then all was silent yet again.

The silence was broken by the clank of the holosuite doors opening. Ensign Harry Kim stopped short when he saw the program running.

"Sorry Tom, thought you'd be running Sangrine's." He took a moment to savor the feel of the program, trying to make out half-familiar shapes in the darkness. The air that passed right through him, chilling him instantly. "What is this?" he whispered, now, for he too feared the deathly stillness of the night.

Lieutenant Tom Paris slowly brought himself out of the almost hypnotic state he was in and stood up, brushing the damp leaves from his uniform. He turned and smiled, not his usual smile. Subdued. Sad.

"Just remembering a night from a long time ago, Harry." He placed his hand on Harry's shoulder lightly in passing, then left. Harry stayed a minute longer, then shivering, whispered, "End program."

The End


End file.
